Dairy Lobby Group Dumps Support for Dairy PRIDE ActA Meat and Dairy Industries Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM

At a House Agriculture Committee hearing yesterday in the nation’s
capital, Michael Dykes, the CEO of the International Dairy Foods Association
(IDFA) weighed in on the Dairy Pride Act, legislation that would prohibit
the use of words like “milk” or “cheese” on dairy-free products.

IDFA represents 85% of the US dairy industry and threw its support behind
this bill when it was introduced earlier this year, so you might be
surprised to learn that support for the Dairy PRIDE act has now soured in
favor of a new resolution:

Dykes stated that this matter of labeling “is probably an issue that
needs to be resolved in the marketplace,” adding that though this has been a
question for quite some time, “the FDA has not concluded these [labels] are
misleading and there have been court challenges and the courts have not
concluded that they have been misleading.”

Representative Doug LaMalfa, who was posing questions to the dairy CEO,
took it even further, saying he’s “mystified at the direction the Dairy
Pride Act is going.” He added that “it seems pretty clear” for consumers
whether “you’re buying in the dairy case as a milk product from a cow or
something like almond milk or one of the other alternatives.”

Dairy demand has been dropping with each generation while plant-based
products soar in popularity, but will Big Dairy ever stop pouting?

In 2010, the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) petitioned the FDA
to stop the use of words like “milk,” “cheese,” “yogurt,” or “ice cream,” on
dairy-free product labels. With no response, in 2016 the NMPF whipped up a
group of Congressmembers to send a letter urging this label mandating.

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